A Note from the Dark Side

You may be wondering what this title means................
It means the other side of this couple, yep me.... The hubby.

I don't know exactly what I should be talking about, but it is time that I added my 2 cents worth to this blog.

Colleen is still able to function very well considering how much she has lost the ability to use her limbs. Her legs have been gone for over a year now, that is not saying that she didn't lose some of them before, it's just when she could no longer operate independently using the walker when needed. She has been fully dependent on someone else moving her for the last 13 + months now. She has shown great courage and a beautiful spirit as she has struggled with her ALS. She always has kept smiling and brightening up everyone's spirits. Imagine that.. The one who has the most to worry and complain about is the one who lights up our lives and lifts our spirits. All of the posts that she has been making has been done at a great effort on her part. She has maybe 20% of her left hand and arm left and that is it. She has had to do everything with an on-screen keyboard from her Dynavox voice computer.

Some people may not know our whole story so I will give you the first small installment here, and tell you how we met.
In 1974, I was working at Utility Trailer in Clearfield's Freeport Center. My older brother, Jerry, also worked there. He approached me in late April one day, at lunchtime, to ask what I was doing after work. I was 19 at the time and had been working there since January of that year. I told him I had no specific plans, so he asked me if I would come and help him coach his ladies softball team (ASA fast pitch for Clinton City), as his assistant coaches were out of town at the time. I told him I would and went to Clinton Elementary school ball field with him, and started something new. I was a softball umpire and basketball referee, doing mostly church games, but had not coached softball before. There was a particularly pretty girl there, who caught my eye immediately, and of course, I had to tease her throughout the whole practice. After we finished for the evening I went home and did whatever for the rest of the night. At work the next day, I hunted my brother down to ask him who the girl was. When I described her, he kind of laughed and said her name was Colleen Fisher, and we had nothing in common..............
Obviously we did find something in common, and have been together 36 1/2 years (yesterday), since our first date. She was only a Junior at Clearfield High when we met, but neither of us dated anyone else since that first date on May 18th 1974, at Ye Lion's Den in South Ogden.
Colleen was a very very very very very good softball player, and we played Co-Ed softball together for many years, playing in many State tournaments. The year we were married, 1975, Colleen was only 18, and as such could play in the 18 and under league for ASA. The coaches of the Sunset City team, Clinton City team and Layton, put all their 18 and under girls together, entered them into the State ASA tournament, which of course they won, and she got to travel to the nationals that were held in Binghamton, New York. They did not win, but they had a great time, and she was the only married member of the team. She could hit the ball a country mile and put the ball out of a men's field in a tournament in Moab, Utah in 1975.

Well, I won't go into a lot more at this time, but needless to say, she was quite the athlete and raised her kids to be pretty good athletes also.